Friday, February 28, 2003

This kid is much, much braver than me.

Everybody go read this story in Salon (you'll have to view a flash ad) about young Israeli Jonathan Ben-Artzi, refusenik and nephew of Benjamin Netanyahu. He's been locked up by the IDF for refusing to enlist.

Since he's been in prison, Ben-Artzi's family says, a series of high-ranking officers have told him that if he'd simply let himself be drafted, he'll be stationed in a hospital and won't have to fight. But Matania Ben-Artzi, Jonathan's father (and Netanyahu's brother-in-law), says his son refused. "He told them the following," says the obviously proud father, himself a military veteran. "Whatever organization I'm going to join, I'll try to do the maximum in that organization, not the minimum. I am a pacifist. I don't want to join this organization. It does not act in my name. It's morally weak for me to be in the organization and yet to avoid doing what others are doing."